He loves me, he loves me not
by dr-r-song
Summary: Five times the doctor shows River he loves her and the one time she actually believes him.
1. Chapter 1: Dances with Angels

Rusty autumnal pallets painted footprints on the chessboard paving slabs. The red and golden leaves had started to find their home on the Parisian pavements escaping to huddle in corners against the turbulent wind. They curled slightly in a valiant attempt to taste the last of the September sun. The earth smelt of decay and rebirth and hope. One final flourish before winter took hold. At least there were two things she could rely on, autumn, and gravity, most of the time.

River Songs heels clipped the pavement in a staccato as she pulled her coat tighter, protection from the coming storm, or a past one dependent on your perspective.

London 2008 had netted her the sum total of spiked hair and a blue shirt running along the high street, with bows and arrows, of all things. A long brown coat and a face that was too young. A face that had been running, running from the bad wolf and the pain of losing Rose Tyler. A face that she couldn't interact with. She had been warned, there were rules. Not that she didn't bend those rules once in a while. River had watched an interesting interaction between him and a pretty young girl who he enthusiastically named Sally Sparrow before sprinting into the subway. From her safe vantage point across the street she shook her head. It's just so typical of him to arm himself with Cupid's bow when she's investigating Angels.

She's tempted to follow him, to see if he actually shoots something. Then let him just try and lecture her about carrying a weapon, but she's here for a reason and doctorates in Archeology don't get earned without a little cheating. Purely for the purposes of historical accuracy of course.

River had been conducting research in the Luna archives when she had come across it, a holotape copy of a film she had watched as a child. She had smiled at the memory. Rory stealing glances as well as popcorn whenever he thought her best friend and mother wasn't looking. Considering that time restraints weren't, strictly speaking, relevant River had flipped the console to play. Discarding her heels on the archive floor she curled her feet underneath her and let the film and memories wash over her. It was comforting, perhaps a little too comforting as when she awoke a few hours later the tape had run its course and a familiar face looked at her from the display.

"The Angels have the phone box." he says, eyes fixed on her.

"Well, hello sweetie. You do have a habit of showing up in the most unusual places," she tells him swinging her feet around to land on the cool archive floor.

"And I didn't even have the chance to get properly dressed for the occasion."

The tape continues to play as she finds her shoes and starts keying in search request data into the archives computers.

"Creatures from another world," he elaborates.

"You don't say," she smirks, bringing up the time and causation schematics relevant to the disk. She pauses a moment to watch as his glasses slowly glide towards the tip of his nose; he secures them with a finger.

"Only when you see them," he continues.

"Oh and I intend to sweetie, just need to map the temporal co-ordinates." She inputs a code into the vortex manipulator strapped to her wrist and downloads the data file for good measure.

"The lonely assassins…" she can hear him say in the background as she slips her boots on and pockets a lipstick, after all, you can never be too careful.

"Oh, Doctor. Assassins are always lonely my love," she tells him, presses a button, and vanishes.

River had waited a few minutes before crossing the street and entering the small shop with the TARDIS blue front door. He had a habit of doing that, leaving the people he had touched with a subconscious need to signal to the world he existed, that he mattered to them.

It's how she had started mapping his timeline in the first place.

An ancient roman household allter engraved with the unmistakable image of the TARDIS, crafted with care out of marble and granite. Poosh, where an entire water park had been created in his honor full of celery shaped slides, scarf striped pools and free jelly babies included in the ticket price. A starship on the back of Whale, who's national holiday involved wearing bow ties and dressing gowns.

Sparrow & Nightingale – Antiquarian Books and rare DVD's was small but welcoming. The smell of tea and ancient paper permeated the air and dialogue from Casablanca filtered through to the shop floor from somewhere in the back. She spent a pleasant five minutes running her hands over the spines of leather bound books printed with golden letters. There was something so tactile about ancient books she had always been drawn to. It was as if the fragments of dust and yellowed paper told their own story, separate from the words on the page

There were bath drenched books that had expanded to twice their normal size, books who's moth bitten pages threatened to disintegrate under the hard press of a fingertip, books that were pristine and ancient and obviously unloved.

These were the books that held the memories of the hundreds of hands that had previously held them. Fragments of history a trained eye could piece together. She was an archaeologist after all. Scanning the shelves, she picked up a copy of The Nature of Angels by Antinous Bellori and took it over to the counter.

"How much, for this one?" she enquired turning the book so the title was visible. The blond haired woman looked up from the counter.

"Unusual choice," she stated sliding the book towards her and tracing an unconscious finger over the eyes of the angel depicted on the front cover.

"I have, very particular interests." River smiled back at her. "Interests that may, I believe, align with yours Ms, Sparrow."

Sally's eyes narrowed and she reflectively glanced behind her before continuing in a whisper.

"Are you with him?" She enquired hoping the question was abstract enough not to provoke any unwanted questions

Rivers smile broadened "Let's just say that the relationship between me and the spiv is… complicated. In actuality, we haven't met. Not that we won't meet. The geography teacher though. Now me and that bow tie have history." River inspects a perfectly manicured nail and sighs wistfully before continuing.

"I'm not doing a great job at explaining myself here am I? How would he do it?" She mused.

A smile spread over Sally's face. Timey wimey she muttered to herself before asking "Would you care for a cup of tea?"

The tea had been strong and conversation easy. Sally was intelligent and charming, her coco colored eyes sparkling as she remembered.

"I don't' know what it was about him. He was bundle of nervous energy, couldn't keep still. I was such a mess, soaked to the skin. But the way he looked at me. Told me he skipped work because life was short and I was hot," she laughed at the memory

"Oh, believe me. Love at first sight isn't as rare as you may think. And you are hot sweetie."

River replied as her hands caressed the teacup up in front of her, a poor substitute for the heat emitted by his skin as she herself remembers falling in love with a man she had just met. As her mother had been to him so he was to her. The first face this face saw, born of a shared fire that forever tied him to her and tethered the both of them to the bluest of blue boxes.

"I know what you mean. "River whispers "Sometimes you meet someone and it's almost as if your life up until that point has been, lacking. Incomplete somehow. Like the cells that make up your molecular structure have been vibrating to the wrong frequency. Then he arrives and you find yourself momentarily paralysed. Unable to move or breathe as your world reconfigured. Your own personal universe realigns. You fight against it because it's impossible. You're too different, but there's something. A small glimmer of hope. It's beautiful. Then you fall, because you have no choice, and you know that he will catch you."

Sally smiled and reddened slightly, unsure if she should have been listening to her confession before continuing. She clears her throat "So, where was I?"

"The hot policeman," prompted River raising a perfectly sculptured eyebrow.

"Oh, yes. Kathy had been thrown back to the 1920's but Billy ended up in 1969, even saw the moon landing live on an old black and white television apparently."

"I'm sorry," river interrupted "did you say 1969?"

"Yes, that's what he said. Are you alright?"

River stared, eyes wide, brow furrowed. Standing she grabbed her cost from the back the chair.

"Sorry, there's somewhere I have to be."

"Wait !" Sally bolted from her seat almost knocking it over, "just tell me what's going on,"

"I'm sorry" River threw over her shoulder, quickly exiting the shop and ducking into an alleyway a few doors down.

The angles had trapped him there, young, so young, before meeting her mother, before meeting her father. And she had been sent to kill him. Momentarily she finds herself unable to breathe, shaking at the implication. She remembers that day. That day when she was someone else. A little girl trapped inside a space suit begging for help and running. Always running.

She inputs the coordinates to Paris September, 2nd 1912, 16:32 and vanished. Now, she was running again.

All of time and space to run in and he could never escape the one thing that tormented him. Himself. He was always there; different faces but always the same. He could still remember. The TARDIS hummed quietly, soothing noises designed to calm him, a subsonic melody designed to cage the fire within him but it was no good. He paced, flipping switches and toggles at random.

"Whenever and wherever you want" she had told him, but it had been a lie, a clever lie to make him believe that he wouldn't loose her. A lie that he wanted to believe so desperately that he had tuned out the rest of the sentence; dismissed it like the sound of his breaking heart. Chosen to believe, against all odds, that he could hold on to her forever. He should have realized that a River always needed to flow, to move. He should have known that a River couldn't be contained, no matter how large the box. Then, one day, she had disappeared.

Hadn't even said goodbye.

Hadn't left him a trail to follow, just cold blank empty spaces where her laughter used to reside.

The TARDIS felt empty, he felt empty in a way that he hadn't in years.

Vastra, Jenny, and Strax had helped of course. They'd been brilliant. Protected him, cared for him and let him wallow. Let his sadness consume him like the cloud he made his home. It couldn't last though, no sadness could consume a mind as hungry as his for long. There had been a puzzle, and a pond, and Clara. Now though, he was alone again with only time as his companion. Lots and lots of time.

He's not above being petulant either and in is current state he could even be described as cruel. He knows it's not her fault, not really but the TARDS and River had shared a bond. Shared a oneness that he was, if he was honest with himself, completely jealous of. He would catch them from time to time conspiratorial whispering to one another when they thought he wasn't paying attention.

Like the time his entire collection of 18th-century hats had been found floating in the swimming Poole on deck ten. Or the time when he had definitely set the coordinated for Breesentimantori, a small planet in the Cariad belt. He had wanted to go snorkelling off Bamabay and watch the migration of the speaking coral.

They ended up in simatrio's largest museum instead. Not that he minded particularly, museum curators were the even worse at cataloguing history than archaeologists. Honestly, how these people kept heir jobs he hadn't a clue. It wasn't his fault that they didn't take kindly to constructive criticism. It wasn't his fault that his Sonic activated the mindus star and they had to rebuild half the wing. If they didn't know the difference between dead and dormant quite frankly they had no right to complain.

The TARDIS had allowed her to leave. That wasn't acceptable. Despite the connection they shared the TARDIS should have know what it would do to him. She had telepathic circuits, how could she not have known.

So the doctor sulked, and the TARDIS listened. Felt his melancholy fingers as they brushed her console. Cooled the air to prevent him from combusting when his anger took over and eventually, relented. One night, when sleep had finally claimed him she reached out. Tugging at the timelines like guitar strings in need to tuning until she found the right frequency. She found her child with ease and with a conspiratorial hum, put her plan into action.


	2. Chapter 2: Distractions

Having neither means or inclination to find alternative attire that was more appropriate to the era River left had left the main path and headed towards the Parisian gardens. When the tower had been built in 1887 she had been there, watching the wrought iron structure come together piece by piece. During her first few years at Luna University River had started to push against the fabric of time to see which strands could be broken and which could be bent.

She started here in Paris.

The tower hadn't been her idea of course. The gardens were another matter entirely. River had spent a pleasant few weeks in the company of the architect, a tweak here and a humble suggestion there and it was done. She had painted him a picture, a message hidden in the curves of the flower beds and the spirals of the paving slabs, a "hello" punctuated by an arrowhead that pointed to the stars.

Her heels slowly sank into the damp grass as she wandered towards the bandstand. Couples huddled together on blankets and the smell of chestnuts permeates the air. She had come here often. First, it was because she was sure he would notice; see her waving at him from the annals of history and stop by for a cup of tea.

He didn't.

These days, figuratively speaking, it was a place to hide. She pauses to toe off her shoes, rescuing them from the soft earth and clearing the worst of the mud away with a polished nail. The grass was cool beneath her feet and the ground felt stable. Stability was good. Spotting an abandoned blanket she repurposed it, positioning it under a tree in the far corner of the concert area. Rivers back nestled into the large oak she sat and watched.

The park had been getting busier and she really should leave but she's tucked away and passers-by pay her no attention. The Parisian authorities weren't likely to forget the chaos the baby lottery had caused in a hurry but it was hardly her fault that the orphanage, or hospital as it liked to call itself, had been run by an absorbalof. She couldn't be blamed directly for the disappearance of the four nursing staff or the sunken and distorted section of floor behind the chief officer's desk. Nor could the sudden retirement of said chief officer be attributed to her actions, no matter how co-incidental her arrival was with the events that unfolded.

When the reporter had turned up to discuss the state of affairs she had seen it as a prime opportunity to kill three problems with a careful word in half of Paris's ear, shutting down the orphanage, rehoming the children whilst simultaneously addressing the funding needs for some good causes. How was a girl supposed to resist? When "La Gazette" had announced the unorthodox baby lottery they could hardly cancel the event, plus she had made a pretty penny being the glamorous compare for the evening's events, after all, what is charity without a little showmanship?

Tucked away in the shelter of the tree however and the couples that occupy the other blankets have other things on their minds and pay her no regard. She reasons that owing to her lipstick and scandalous display of skin they might be inclined to give her a wide birth. She smiles, she's been called much worse than a woman if ill repute, let them think what they may.

Two parabolic arches support the stained glass roof of the bandstand. Geometrically beautiful their dark wood balances the diamond shaped fragments of glass suspended between them. They fan out from one central point each side telling its own story but neither encroaching on the other. One side of the structure depicted the sun, licks of fire erupting from its molten surface only to be contained by the strong arch surrounding it. The other, the gift that light gave. A tree. It grew from the center of the sun violet and pink blossom caressing its branches protecting the birds that nestled in its branches below a TARDIS blue sky. On a day like today, when the sun hung low in the autumn sky, the bandstand swam in a kaleidoscope of colour. It glinted off the orchestra's instruments fracturing into multi-tonal rainbows that bathed performers and spectators alike. A stained glass glitter ball. This, above all else, was the reason she stayed.

The shadows have started to play amongst the flower beds turning red to crimson and whites to pale yellow. She finds herself transfixed by the subtle changes, the way the light dances over the water pooled on the paving, carefree.

Closing her eyes she lets the baritone hum of the cello being tuned for the night's performance wash over her. It settled deeply between her hearts before being joined by the violins soprano, the slow draw of a bow over strings, a pause then another. Practice notes, notes she knows all too well. She had been practicing for so long. Practicing a tune that everyone else knew and she was forced to play by ear. But the tune of River Song had remained elusive. How was she supposed to be this woman, the woman who her mother was so impressed by, who her father respected, who the doctor loved?

The doctor had left her though, they all had. Left her with a new name, a new face, a fistful of rules and a blue book. In truth she had no idea what she was doing. She had been tempted to look herself up whilst in the archives, a small peak at her future past. The details weren't even important a simple search for her new name plotting dates and times of appearance in history, minus the events themselves would have sufficed. She had almost done it too, finger poised to press the button when she had felt it. It started at an almost atmospheric level, a tingling in the air, electrons buzzing before a storm. Isolated and centered only around her. Curious, she pushed against it, moving her hand forwards. The level of resistance changed, first water, then sand, then viscous. It clung to her making her, making her limbs feel heavy and cumbersome.

Time was fighting back.

In her mind she saw flashes, a hundred thousand possibilities of what this action may bring, planets she had never visited exploded, war ranged across a distant galaxy, and the Doctor died. His body falling through the vortex still, lifeless, and alone. Without protection the vortex tears at him, hungrily ripping away pieces of him. The strip of blue fabric around his neck is torn away, spiraling into the void. It burns; brief and bright, then disintegrates. She pulled her hand away and the images faded, she finds herself able to move and the air becomes breathable once more. Spoilers, evidently, were not allowed.

She isn't even sure she wanted to be River Song not when she was only just starting to realise who Melody is, what Melody was, who melody had been. Her whole life she had been manipulated, her perspective twisted liked tightly woven silk. Since enrolling at Luna University she had sought to find her own answers. Was The Doctor the oncoming storm? Was he the destroyer of worlds? If he was such a terrible man then why did he profess to love her with his last breath, was it a trick? Was he just 'The trickster' playing the ace up his sleeve? If he was that manipulative why did he choose to travel with her parents? Why save them in Berlin? Why save her? So many questions, so much time and space to hunt for the answers. Sighing she adjusts her posture tucking her feet underneath her, long skirt cascading over her ankles. Resting her head against the trunk she allows the music to wash over her, the tree seems to hum a counter melody filling the spaces between each breath, each heartbeat, and she feels more at home here than she has, anywhere. Her eyes heavy she finally allows sleep to take her.

It was the absence of sound that woke him. The lacking hollow noise of the TARDIS on standby, landed. The console is bathed in a soft blue light, the engines are on tick over and immediately he's worried. She has never done this before. Well, perhaps 'never' is not entirely accurate. There has been a handful of times that something or another has had the audacity, and darn right cheek, to attempt to steal her; move her to another dimension, trade her in for scrap metal, force him to turn up somewhere, try to steal her. Oh, all right perhaps more than a few times but none of them felt like this. Normally there was smoke and explosions and adrenaline and running. Normally she would have woken him, but not this time, and it unnerves him. He glances at the door ready to barrel out of it and demand answers from the first person he literally and figuratively runs into but, just this once, and because she'll never know, an environmental check may be in order first. The TARDIS's hum pitches a few notes higher and he has the strangest feeling that she's amused.

"So, you sexy thing," he says, spinning the monitor round and tapping the back of it until the loose connection pings back into place and it splutters to life.

"What have you got for me..."

The sight of her makes the words stick in his throat. She's curled up against the tree right next to the TARDIS hands resting against the trunk. Her skin is pale in the fading light but it sparkles, illuminated by a thousand coloured lights blinking in and out. She is a nebula, infinite and contained, impossible and beautiful. Her hair glistens as if sprinkled with a million sunsets and he knows that this image of her will forever be burnt onto his hearts. The anger and frustration he felt at her departure drain away

with each passing second, how can he be angry with her? He shouldn't be allowed to even look at her. His wife. Glorious and brand new.

" You, little minx," he mutters under his breath to the TARDIS not expecting a reply as he lays a finger on the monitor, tracing her form in the particles of dust that he can never seem to get rid of. He wonders if he should change into his dress suit and dinner jacket. A hat would also be appropriate, if not a requirement if he wore the suit, and date night with River normally required a certain amount of finery. Well, perhaps not a requirement but it was an excuse to dress up. Not that he needed excuses. But going to the wardrobe meant moving further away from her and he just can't deal with that right now. He could reconfigure the TARDIS and move the wardrobe to the control room, but the last time he did that a pearl cufflink got lodged under the disco lights switch and he had to carefully dissolve it with an acidic compound acquired from Zextar. No, this would have to do.

He catches his reflection in one of the mirrored panels and smooth's down his hair. His face is worn and tired, an unfolded piece of intricate origami pulled taut over his gangly frame. The mask he chose to hide behind. He feels slightly guilty about that, that he looks so young to her although he doubts she ever took notice. River always had the annoying habit of seeing right through any face he chose to wear. She only ever saw him.

The TARDIS, he assumes, must be in cloaked mode or she would have noticed. Perhaps on some unconscious level she already had. This may not be the River he wanted right now but he wasn't about to pass up the opportunity, not when he didn't know how many opportunities they had left. Straightening his bow tie he approaches the TARDIS doors and pushes them open ever so slightly. Shimmying around the door he carefully extradites himself from the ship and walks around it meet with his sleeping princess.

Her breathing is even and steady as he crouches down next to her, she looks peaceful. If she were older he would have sunk down on the blanket with her, holding her in his arms but she's not. He can see that clearly. Tiny tendrils of regeneration energy still lay in her curls, minuscule and certainly invisible to anyone but him, but they are there. She can't be more than two years into her new body. Two years away from Berlin and their first kiss, the kiss that saved him and cost her so much.

He leans in, his mouth close to her ear and whispers "River," softly followed in short succession by "Ow! What was that for? " As River uncoiled like a snake and the flat of her hand connected with his cheek.

"You? What are you doing here? " She demanded getting to her feet, her eyes wide.

"Well, you know. Paris, an orchestra, the TARDIS, you, the usual things really," he mumbles looking up at her as he rubs at his tingling face.

"Do you know how infuriating you are?"

"Or Hello sweetie?" he offers as a suggestion "I'm not infuriating, annoyingly brilliant, spectacularly resourceful, fantastic sense of style"

"Don't forget modest," she counters raising a sarcastic eyebrow.

"Now you're being flippant," The Doctor complains getting to his feet and brushing leaves off his tweed jacket.

"I can't do this right now. I, unlike you it seems, have more pressing matters to contend with Doctor, so just... go. Fly off to wherever it is you disappear to. " She huffs scanning the ground for her shoes.

"Have I done something wrong? Are you, are you crying? " He watches her carefully, there is definite moisture around her lower lids and he mentally slaps himself again for upsetting her even though he has no idea what he's done or not done to cause it.

"Yes! No. You're just better off far away from me. I, I'm dangerous! " She shouts putting her hands on her hips.

"Oh I know," he smiles "you bad bad girl, and I shouldn't like that. Kind of do a bit though, and not to me your not." There was something about River barefoot and annoyed that did funny things to his insides. Although, normally such occurrences were accompanied by running, and he can't shake the feeling that there may be danger nearby. Just in case he takes out his sonic and starts a general scan for non-humanoid life forms in their vicinity.

"Especially to you! Doctor, I killed you" she pauses as he scans the trunk of the tree she had been sleeping against. "What are you doing?"

"Just… checking" he says, flipping the sonic to check that the tree is defiantly a tree. The readout is blank and he is about to go back to the TARDIS to do another scan when he remembers that he still hasn't found the time to add sensors for wood. He taps at it hoping that this will somehow help. "And then you saved me. As far as first dates go granted it was mixed signals but."

"God don't you ever listen? I'm telling you to run." Her hand snaps forward to take the sonic from him but for once he's faster. Her hand makes contact with the device and he pulls it and her forwards towards him. She's still shimmering from the light emitting from the bandstand and he feels like he has tethered a nebula, ephemeral and precious.

"Never listen unless it's something you want to hear," he whispers his lips so close to her ear that he's tempted to take her lobe in his mouth and tug it slightly, make her forget whatever torment she's apparently going through. "Rule… if forget the rule number. Looks like you stuck with me," he says softly.

"I tried to kill you." She says almost to herself.

"No, you didn't. You actually killed me, not that I'm keeping score but hey look I'm fine. Legs, arms bow tie." He tries to wiggle his non-existent eyebrows to comical effect.

"No. I tried to kill you before. In 1969." She tries to pull away and brings the sonic, and with it, her, closer to his hearts.

"Sorry, not following," he says shaking his head now buried in her curls.

River sighs and turns her head to rest on his shoulder not wanting to look him in they eyes. "You were younger, different face, so was I for that matter. Before I found my parents before... And I know what that would have meant."

"It didn't happen" he pulls her closer placing a hand on her hip.

"But time can be rewritten," she says softly " I can't risk it. I can't risk losing you."

"River Song, you will never loose me."

She pulls away so she can look him in the eyes using the blanket's edge as a shield. "I don't even know what I'm doing. I've looked for you in so many places you know. I've seen your story painted across the sky of a thousand different worlds. I can't… I don't know how to be River Song. Do you know what it's like? To be shown a picture of the person are supposed to become, have been. To have everyone expect something of you and to have no idea how to get there? I'm a murderer, and a thief. I jump before looking and somehow find my way out, and I'm good at it. More than good, brilliant," she says without a hint of modesty " but I don't know how to be her." She neglects to add the woman you love. For all her faults she's not deluded.

The Doctor shakes his head, not sure how he deserves such a creature. "River; Melody, Mells, assassin," he sees her visibly flinch at that and mentally berates himself before continuing. "Savior, the woman who killed the Doctor, the woman who saved him, daughter, w…" he stops himself before he can say the word and hopes she doesn't notice. Foreknowledge would be dangerous even if technically he had already proposed to her.

"Wise, beautiful." He says instead reaching out to lay a hand on her cheek.

"Do you know why I chose the name Doctor? It's a promise, a reminder to myself to try and live up to the name. In a thousand years I don't think I've managed it yet, but I try. I left you so you could choose. Choose to be River, choose to be Melody, choose to be the person you wanted to be, because a name that you choose is just a promise to yourself. You don't need to know how to be River Song. You already are." He tries to let her know that she is everything to him with simple words but they aren't enough. They would never be enough, and he doesn't want to scare her. Not this young. Too many spoilers, too many things he could alter just by being here

"I'm nothing like you," she tells him.

"And you are **so** wrong River." She looks at him quizzically and he smiles "Spoilers," he says through a smile moving his finger to rest on her soft lips and she inhales sharply at the contact.

The orchestra started to play and he feels the music wash over them. The sun has almost set and round the parabolic arch, a hundred gas lights had started to burn. An accordion had started to play a slow sixteen beat rhythm, dipping and swaying. The notes hung in the air around them the higher notes tickling the tree branches, the lower caressing the air that lay between them filling their lungs.

The doctor smiles conspiratorially as his hips start to sway seemingly on their own accord. He aims his sonic at the lights increasing their intensity but not their heat. In the distance, he can hear a gasp from the other spectators as a rainbow of colour cascades around them spilling onto the grass. He makes a quick alteration to the settings and with a wink in Rivers direction he aims the device above his head at a passing cloud and sends a quick blast into the evening sky. The light refracts off the small droplets that start to cascade dispersing the light in the droplets of water. Each droplet creates a minuscule rainbow, prisms of refracted light that fall around them saturating the gathering with a hundred million variations of coloured light. He pockets the screwdriver and leans forward holding out his hand.

"River Song" he beams " May I have this dance"

She shakes her head at this impossible man before her but steps forward all the same.

"I've seen you dance Doctor." She comments softly "It's more like vaguely choreographed falling, and I'm not wearing any shoes"

She raises her eyes to his and he advances towards her. His eyes drink her in. She's so young, so fragile. Oh, she hides it well but he has spent years mapping her moods. He had learned to swim in the emotional sea that River inhabits and for once, he has the advantage. It's been years since he has seen her this young so full of potential. The things this woman will do.

He catches her wrist, bringing her the rest of the distance forward and places his hand around her waist stepping in closer.

"That's a false assumption. I have one of those… A level thingamys in modern dance. And in fairness last time I did have other things on my mind." He takes the opportunity to bop her on the nose watching in delight as it depresses slightly and springs back into shape. The faint smell of the vortex still clings to her, sweet and slightly metallic and he buries his face in her hair pulling her closer so their bodies are touching.

"Sweetie, I never imagined you to be so forward" she gasps as he walks them over to a patch of grass that will be their makeshift dance floor and smiles at the familiar endearment from her lips. He had almost forgotten how magical the nights they shared were. Buried them under heartache and longing for more, ran away from them out of fear them may be their last.

"Well, I've learned a lot from you over the years. I had to, to keep up"

She tilts her head back quizzically but remains silent. If he's going to dispense spoilers, even small ones, she isn't going to complain. Not when she's in his arms and for once the universe seems to be on her side.

"River, you and I are moving in opposite directions" he spins her away from him in time to the music watching as her hair fans out like the omega nebula catching rainbows in its path.

"And when we come together it's not always at the right time" he pulls her back towards him and takes a step to the side so they brush against each other but don't meet head on emphasizing his point.

"At the beginning, I'm a little ahead of you" his foot reaches out past her in a long sweeping motion causing her to match his movements in reverse. She smiles her eyes no longer holding back tears and the Doctor smiles back thankful that he had done something right for once.

"Most of the time though it's you in the lead" he tilts his head to the left and she takes the hint repeating his earlier movement in reverse so his is on the back foot.

"And I will need you go be gentle with me, because. Well, I can be a bit of an idiot" River scoffs gently and lays a hand over his hearts; surprised to feel they are beating as fast as her own. He shifts his body around hers bending her over in a low dip and she gasps suddenly off balance.

"But I will always, always be there to catch you when you fall," he says arms caressing her back as he lifts her back up.

She looks into his eyes, old and ancient and deeper than the sea and she's so tempted to believe in the love she sees reflected in his rainbow infused irises. She wants so much to believe that their love is shared but rule one is that the Doctor lies. Pretty lies, telling her what she wants to hear. It's tempting to give in and she does believe him, to an extent. Heads the warning, the request to be patient with him but she knows he will never feel like she does. Feel like a part of him is missing when they're apart. But for tonight she is content just to hold him, under a sea of rainbows on a late September evening and hope for a future that could never be.


End file.
